Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 12 July 1937 — Page 12

PAGE 12

The Indianapolis Times

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

W. HOWARD LUDWELL DENNY President Editor

ROY FERREE

MARK Business Manager

Price tn Marion County, 8 cents a copy; delivered by carrier, 12 cents a week.

Owned and published daily (except Sunday) by . The Indianapolis Times Publishing Co. 214 W. Maryland St. Mail subscription rates in Indiana, $3 & year; outside of Indiana, 65 cents a month.

he RlIley 5551

Give Light ana the People Will Find Their Own Way

Member of United Press, Scripps - Howard Newspaper Alliance, NEA Service, and Audit Bureau of Circulations.

L SCRIPPS ~ NOWARD |

MONDAY, JULY 12, 1937

ON ITS WAY OUT F anyone doubts that the evil business of hiring children in these United States is on its way to limbo let him feel the pulse of the 75th Congress. In this Congress are 37 bills and amendments attacking child labor in one way or another. It looks as if Congress will brush aside the lingering objections from the states’ righters and take steps to free the estimated 800,000 or so children under 16 mow being exploited in mines, mills, sweatshops, and other forms of industry. Let us hope that this Congress will not adjourn without extending the New Deal to the nation’s child workers.

HE HONES FOR PEACE T couldn't be the climate that is keeping him away from Washington, for surely no one would pick Uvalde as a summer resort. Nor could it be a lazy streak. For checking up on the chickens and cows and billygoats at his Texas ranch must be no less arduous than presiding over the Senate a couple of hours a day. Shortly after the election, the “era of good feeling” was proclaimed. And, lo, Mr. Garner was one of the first to return to Washington to bask in the glow of harmony and fraternity. Then, in quick succession, came the President’s court-packing plan, economy waves, spending surges, strikes and more strikes. Hands across the table became clenched fists. Political lightning flashed and thunder rolled. Cactus Jack slipped into his limousine and motored away to Texas, “where the woodbine twineth and the whippoorwill mourn-

eth for its mate.” From which observations we deduce that Mr. Garner

is a man who doesn’t like turmoil.

FRANCE PAYS THE FIDDLER E'RE glad we're not paying taxes in France. The emergency government revenue decree, according to the United Press, provides “higher income taxes, higher real estate taxes, new stamp taxes, higher production taxes, higher tariffs, higher gasoline taxes, higher postage and telephone rates, higher tobacco prices and higher railroad fares.” The tax on all incomes above $800 a year is increased 20 per cent. Yes, we're glad we're not paying taxes in France. We hope Americans never will have to pay such taxes as are now loaded on the French. That is why we can't help

wincing every time we look at a Treasury statement. The | latest statement, covering the first seven days of this fiscal | year, recorded these items: Expenses, $271,327,756.31; re- |

ceipts, $125,817,177.93. So in one week 2145,510,578.38 is

added to the gross public debt that now aggregates $36,- |

535,071,336.15. What has all this to do with French taxes, you ask? Only this: The United States is doing now what France did too long. Our Government is borrowing and building up. the public debt. France borrowed and built up her public debt until she destroyed her credit, and could borrow no more: then she had to tax in earnest. And every day our Government borrows and adds to the public debt, it moves one day closer to the inevitable reckoning when it, too, must

tax in earnest.

MORALS AND TAXES ONGRESS, at work on legislation to stop tax avodances, might do a better job if it would pause a moment to consult the Gospel according to St. Matthew —especially this passage: “First cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.” We agree with President Roosevelt that multimillionaires who hire clever lawyers to beat their taxes are trying to buy civilization at a discount.

But since this whole crusade has been pitched on the | moral theme that every citizen should contribute to the | cost of government according to his ability to pay, Con- |

gressmen receiving $10,000 a year can hardly be classed as underprivileged persons entitled to cut-price government. Congressmen pay Federal income taxes on their salaries.

income taxation. So are the salaries of some 800,000 other Federal jobholders. True, many of them get salaries too small to be subject to tax. But on the other hand, many receive salaries higher than are received by private citizens who pay both Federal and state income taxes. Yet Congressmen and other Federal payrollers enjoy the protection of the states wherein they reside. They utilize state school systems, state highways and state courts, on a basis of equality with private citizens whose incomes are taxed to maintain that protection and those services. Also there are some 2,400,000 officials and employees of state, county and municipal governments, whose salaries are exempt from Federal income taxation. Yet the Army, the Navy, public works and other Federal services are carried on as much for their benefit as for the benefit of private citizens whose incomes are taxed to help pay the costs. The courts are primarily responsible for creating this discrimination. They have ruled, illogically we think, that for the National Government to tax the salaries of state and local government employees, or for state governments to tax Federal salaries, would be an invasion of “sovereign” powers. But Congress will be at fault so long as it does nothing to remove this discrimination. Rep. Cochran of Missouri has proposed a constitutional amendment to do just that. While turning the heat on immoral “incorporated vachts” and “incorporated hobby farms,” Congress would do well to pull that proposed amendment out of its pigeon- * hole and turn some heat on “incolporated jobs”

oh

But, because of what the courts have said the | Constitution means, their salaries are exempt from state |

| Sunk Off the Coast of

: oe aus BRE

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

A SAR AC

JUST DIG UP A GOOD

‘suUIT case’!

Washington

By Raymond Clapper

Almost Certain, but ‘Streamlined’ | Measure Is Declared to Be Too Mild.

| ASHINGTON, July 12.—Wages-and-hours legislation is almost certain to go through at this session unless a prolonged | filibuster on the Supreme Court Bill prevents action. Roosevelt says he hopes Congress will act. The John Lewis political or- | ganization, labor's Nonpartisan League, has started a | campaign to put the heat on individual Senators and

Representatives. The measure, if enacted, likely" will take substantially the form in which it now stands as revised by | the Senate Committee. Its cen- | tral feature is the creation of a Labor Standards Board of five members which would be em- | powered to fix minimum wages at any point up to 40 cents an hour and maximum hours at ahy | point down to 40 hours a week. Thus the revised bill eliminates the controversial Section 5 of the | original draft which John Lewis and many others opposed on the ground that it would enable the Federal board to fix wages not only under the minimums but above them. In revision care was taken to make more specific provisions excluding agricultural employees from the scope of the measure. In several other respects the measure was streamlined down and highly debatable sections eliminated. = ” = N the revised draft, special emphasis was laid upon inaugurating the wage-and-hour standards by gradual degrees. The measure laid down a policy on this, stating that “it is impossible to achieve such results arbitrarily by an abrupt change so drastic that it might do serious injury to American indus-

Mr. Clapper

try and American workers, and it is therefore neces- |

sary to achieve such results cautiously, carefully and without disturbance and dislocation of business and industry.” This section suggests the desire of the state committee to avoid strong-arm tactics and to place no intolerable burdens upon industry. Numerous exemptions are provided for such as seasonal or emergency operations, apprentices, superannuated or partially incapacitated employees. The bill seems about as mild as it could be and still be a minimum-wages and maximum-hours bill. It provides for a $16 week. Even this modest figure— $832 a year is far less than a family bread-winner could support children on—is to be introduced grad- | ually so that there will be no industrial dislocation.

" s ”

HE government, under such a bill, would barely show its hand, and leave the real problem of a decent living minimum to labor and industry, or, practically speaking, giving Lewis and the C. I. O. a | clear field. Lewis was afraid for a time that the Government would cut into his mass wage fight in ie lower brackets and do the job itself by legislaon. Arn eventual minimum wage of $16 a week will not impose any unjustifiable burden upon industry. In fact the bill does so little that it seems hardly worth the bother of going through with it, except that it will make good campaign material for next year.

Wages and Hours Bill Passage Held |

The Hoosier Forum

1 wholly disagree with what you say, but ‘will defend to the death your right to say it.—Voltaire.

'DENTES ROOSEVELT WILL BALANCE U. S. BUDGET By A. J. McKinnon | I have about as little use for Hugh Johnson as IT have for fascism. How- | ever, whatever may be said against (Hugh Johnson, our President will never balance the budget and before | his term is up, he will have this [country in debt to the extent of 65 billion dollars. The bills on the floor of the House | by Reps. Voorhis, Maverick, Colden and others will prove that President Roosevelt's father placed his estate in trust for a very good reason. My suggestion to Mr. Maddox is [that Congress ought to take back |the power granted to the President. | There is no sane person in America | that knows what is going on in Con- | gress, who will not admit that the | fight the President put on against the American people is the fight of fascism. I am American, and I am in this fight. I am against Maddox or any other individual who will (stand up for a President who is far from being constitutional. | Ny B» Ww | PREDICTS DECLINE IN BUYING POWER | By Worker Just what effect will the dismissal of 300,000 PWA workers have | the workers employed in pri- | vate industry? The buying power issued to WPA workers is responsible for three times as many jobs in pri- | vate industry. So we can expect a million men to lose their jobs. How [can the budget be balanced, unless

(we balance production? Let Mr. | Hopkins answer,

2 » n | HARRY BRIDGES PRAISED AS LABOR LEADER By M. Kelley, Beech Grove It is with surprise I note the attitude you take toward Harry Bridges. Half-truths and distorted facts seem out of place in this publication. The San Francisco News gave a very accurate account of what the J. I. A. strike was all about, and I could give the names and records of those that drug that red herring brand of communism. The same element tried to brand Upton Sinclair, the Democratic nominee for Governor, with the same brand. The true facts of that strike are that company-dominated unions had their foremen in key positions. Mr. Bridges is the first man to put up a winning battle against such corruption, and it's a surprise to me that he is not in Lewis’ position instead of being a mere assist ant. All the A. F. of L. labor organizations supported him in that strike, not for higher wages or working conditions, but to establish a hiring hall where each member

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Make your letter short, so all can have a chance. Letters must be signed, but names will be withheld on request.)

would be given an equal chance to work. Of course, I realize your right to your own personal opinion, but I do think it's out of place in the enviable position the Scripps-Howard papers have made for themselves as most people recognize their just policies, ” ” 2 INDUSTRIAL BREAKDOWNS HELD DUE TO INTEREST By Reader Our national wealth increases at the rate of 4 per cent per year in normal times. This increase is the total profit of all industry. However, in our financial control of industry, finance demands a toll of 6 to 7 per cent as interest on borrowed capital. To take or demand more than has been actually created as wages for capital hire creates a breakdown of industry at regular intervals. Mathematical science does not permit violation of the mathematical equation. As a result, capital loses its principal represented by bonds and mortgages and

SENSITIVE

By ROBERT O. LEVELL

Those who are too sensitive to take whate'r be said, Should never send a single word (hat they would ever dread, For if they cannot take, as good as they would ever send, They'd better never say a word wherein they might offend.

Tf tables turned and they'd receive the words they had sent, If such a turn at any time would make them take resent, For people in glass houses should never throw a stone If they can't take as good as they would throw out from their own.

DAILY THOUGHT

Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation 10 days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.— Revelation 2:10.

DY bravely enduring, an evil which cannot be avoided is overcome. —Old proverb.

HITS TIMES FOR

lowers the capital share value below par. Nature or science overrules ignorance. Deflation corrects the violation.

2 u n

QUOTING PRESS By Hiram Lackey The Pittsburgh Press is indeed a splendid newspaper for The Times editor to form his opinions from. We may judge its accuracy from the fact that Andy Mellon is dictator of Pittsburgh. If Mellon were to tell the people of Pittsburgh not to take this Scripps - Howard newspaper, such a demand on his part would ruin the newspaper. The Pittsburgh Press cannot write | anything that is too strongly op- | posed to the views of Mellon. So if The Times wishes to continue to slander the C. I. O. and John L. Roosevelt & Co., it had better find a better newspaper from which to quote. The informed workers are all for John L. Lewis, the incorruptible. ”n ” =

“REPENTANT” ROCKEFELLER CALLED QUIET REFORMER

By Bull Mooser, Crawfordsville History painted for posterity the | picture of the Rockefeller career. | That picture is villainous, and it is | only right that it should be. It! would be unfair to hold up that career as a pattern of virtue for heroworship. But there is another picture of Mr. Rockefeller, a picture which most newspapers seem entirely to have missed. That is the picture of Mr. Rockefeller, the repentant villain, the man realizing the harm he had done and helping to repair that harm. Tt should be oredited to Mr. Rockefeller that he repeatedly refused to allow his morey to be used to battle reform. Instead, he endowed institutions, such as the great University of Chicago, for the study of reform measures. Nor did he ever place a restraining hand on those institutions when they were accused of being radical. Rather, he encouraged them to lead the field in radicalism. ‘Mr. Rockefeller realized that the methods and practices which he and his lawyers had discovered for gaining protection of the courts and de=fying the public could not continue. That if they did continue, it would mean the end of representative government. Hence, in his quiet, taciturn way, he helped prepare the public for reform. It seems symbolic that as Mr, Rockefeller passed on, the Court system which enabled him to defy the public is also passing on. It is

my true belief that he would have had it that way.

By Heywood Broun

Lippmann's Espousal of Filibuster Proposal by Senator Burke Brings Surprise and Sorrow to Broun.

ASHINGTON, July 12.—A very strange and very interesting thing has just happened to the mind of Mr. Lippmann. : Al« most overnight, it seems he has become.an emotionalist and a hero worshiper. -But

most curious of all is Walter Lippmainh's choice of the knight in shining armor whose white plume he proposes to follow. I am, to be sure, in no position to criticize anyone who hitches his wagon to some skylark’'s tail, mistaking that bright bird for an authentic star. When Walter and I were “both comparatively young he stuck to his last of cool impartiality, while I prostrated myself in adoration of Richard the Lion-hearted. as depicted by Walter Scott. Through the courtesy of G. A. Henty I was with Clive in India at a time when Walter Lippmann remained; at home and read the Constitution. And so it is with mingled -surprise and sorrow that I discover the pentup passion of Mr. Lipp= mann pouring forth upon am un= worthy object. Naturally T mean unworthy to stand as the brightest planet in, the Lippmann firmament, for I have no doubt that Burke of Nebraska is a good politician and one of the leading contenders for the featherweight title. gE Senator Burke is as picturesque as a covered bridge, but a little less reliable as a medium by which a precious cargo of human freight may be transported across the flood. : ” 8 > a Mr. Lippmann has already advanced a rod. and it must be that the roar of the torrent deafens him to the fact that the boards shriek and moan beneath his feet. He has hailed Senator Burke's plan to prevent any vote being taken on Supreme Court legislation as “The Great Fili~ buster” It seems to Walter that it is a sound demo= cratic principle to substitute blustering for ballpting. “To stand up and rdfuse to let this thing be fione, to obstruct, delay and oppose this invasion, is in the highest degree honorable, and those who have a part

| in the fight will take their place in the company of

the gallant men who have established our liberties and have preserved them.” And again Mr. Lippmann says, “There is no objection to the obstruction. of a filibuster. There are no measures held up by it that urgently need to be passed.” : And vet I have a vague recollection that on several occasions Mr. Lippmann has expressed the opinion that the Wagner law should be immediately revised, There are farmers who think the tenancy bill is important and workers who have a vital interest, in the wages and hours measure. But beyond these practical considerations I rise timidly to ask whether the Constitution was not designed to establish a representative form of government. v

8 u o AM

R. BURKE'S plan to filibuster seems heroic: to Walter, because Walter thinks that Burke is right on the Supreme Court issue. However, I think Mr. Lippmann places too ‘much faith in the tenacity of Mr. Burke. When if was suggested that the Senate should sit in session on Wednesday afternoon Mr, Burke and his allies thade a most prodigious holler. They were out to defend American liberties and all that, but Wednesday was the day for the All-Star baseball game. And so the great debate was put over. a:

EW YORK, July 12.—Ham Fish's berating of Mrs. Roosevelt's unselfish services to charity is politics at the ultimate low. It may be a technical violation of some obscure Treasury ruling for Mr. A to engage to do something for Mr. B if he will pay a fixed sum of money to charity C—and then

for Mr. A not to pay income tax on what charity C receives,

But the evil in any tax evasion is that the evader

makes something for himself by not ‘paving in taxes as much as he ought to pay. Nothing of this sort is charged against Mrs. Roosevelt. She made the nominal sum of $10 out of the broadcasts for which a charity received $3000 a week. An agent and & lawyer got a commission and a fee out of which they Pr] have ios Checked wm ate 3 ve not ch this and it may be wrong, but I believe that if the charity in question had Rt the deal directly with the broadcasting company, it being a nonprofit institution, even this highly technical question would not have risen at all.

*r &* 0 did Mr. Fish raise it? Obvio Wi usly I the hore

by attempting to throw Roosevelt, some of it would

General Hugh Johnson Says —

Fish's Attack on Mrs. Roosevelt's Tax Exemption Claim Low-Down Politics And Evidently Made in an Attempt to Discredit the President Himself.

The Washington Merry-Go-Round

Filibuster Is Held Unlikely as Court Bill Opponents Fail to Keep Unity: Administration Plan Is to Let Debate Run on Until Vote Can Be Forced.

in no way lightened by the offender’s protest that he has only the highest respect for Mrs. Roosevelt. This column has protested the Administration's methods of attempting to discredit wealthy men by publishing (with the implication of tax evasion) their tax returns prepared in exact accordance with the Treasury's own instructions. It was abominable. But one abomination does not excuse a worse one. Mrs.

Roosevelt had nothing to do with what the Treasury did to the economic royalists. She was merely using her position to do as much good as she could. The attack on her is worse than unchivalrous. It is down= right dirty. Tt is unpatriotic because it holds the political methods and the standards of gentlemanly ethics in this country up to justified contempt in the eves of the whole world. . 2 ® o . T is fortunate that there is at least some amusement in the recent epidemic of tax charges on poth sides—not the least of which is the report that the President is in the Christmas tree business on nis Hyde Park farm. It works right in with his general line of goods because, for years, he certainly has been in the Santa Claus business at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, Washington, D. C, with Henry Wallace and Harty i were Hoviing out OR the hoys on bis on on free sideline, ¥

By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen

ASHINGTON, July 12.=Despite all the threats of a ter against the Supreme Court reorganization bill, it is a good bet that there will be none, Here are the reasons: X 1. The ists who favor this maneuver are too few in number to be able to wage a filibuster that would mean anything. When they announced their scheme they expected to stampede their associates into following them. The result was exactly the op-

te. : 2. Despite their outward show of cohesion and organization the antis actually have little of either, Their difficulty is too many generals and too few

The attitude of the rear row seems less said the better, and the sooner the Court row is over the happier they will be.

antis compelled to talk in order to stave off a Wote. Administration leaders are convinced that several days of such pressure will quickly shatter obstruce tion to taking a ballot. Pending its final push, the Administration will re= cess the Senate at the close of each day, a parliamens« tary strategy that will bar more than two speeches by a member on the issue. This puts an added burdeli on any filibuster attempt. b ” Ld " ENRY MORGENTHAU has his officials so ine timidated when it comes to press relations’ that if a newspapermaf walked up behind one of them and suddenly said, “Boo!” the officials probably wauld reply: “I can't speak for publication.” ~~ Here is a conversation occurring recently between a newspaperman and Archie Lochhead, one of More genthau’s assistants. hoa Correspondent: Are you meeting the Brazilian Fie nance Minister today? T Lochhead: I can't speak for publication. C=The Brazilian Embassy states that you have an appointment with the Minister. , L—I can’t speak for publication. C==The State Department says that the Minister conferring with you. L-1 can’t speak for publication, Lochhead

O==Is, your name ? LI can’t speak for publication,

. “

§